


La Petit Mort

by myialeighanne



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Non-Graphic Smut, Non-Graphic Violence, Other, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-22
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:14:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21523546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myialeighanne/pseuds/myialeighanne
Summary: la petit mort: the sensation of post-orgasm as likened to death.
Relationships: Harley Keener/Peter Parker, Harley Keener/Peter Parker/Wanda Maximoff
Comments: 2
Kudos: 29





	1. Chapter 1

The room was silent, save for a steady drip and two heavy breaths.

The girl in the chair was slumped backward, arms hanging by her side and head back as if she was asleep.

A whisper breaks their silence.

"We should go."

A nod. Two people shuffling to get up. Dripping slowing then stopping. A door closing, a car driving away. 

Peter loved the open road. The wind blowing through his hair as they drove, the sense of freedom, the scenery, it made him feel like he could breathe.  
He was sitting in the passenger seat, feet up on the dashboard, head resting against the car door next to the open window. Harley was singing along to some trashy country song on the radio while he was driving and Peter laughed at his weird faces.

He was happy.

Road tripping the country with someone he loved, no obligations, no restrictions, just fun and long summer evenings.

They pulled up to a roadside motel as the sun started to set.

Harley keeps singing as he parks the car and they get out, laughs as Peter dances around him. They’re shaking with laughter as they enter the motel, and the lady at the front desk beams at them. 

Harley did the talking as Peter leaned against him, head on his shoulder, glancing around. 

They finish checking in and paying, getting the keys to the farthest cabin from the road. They dumped their bags there and went over to dinner, racing each other to the building and basking in the last few rays of summer sunlight.

The night was cold and smelled of pine and sand. Peter held Harley close to him and admires the boy as he slept. Even after all this time he still took his breath away.

The shape of his lips, breathing softly against Peter’s chest, his long light eyelashes, fanning out over his cheeks, his heartbeat against Peter's, his breath aligned with his.

It made him feel things he knew he shouldn't. Something more than love. Something they would both have to deal with...

The boy in the bar was a loudmouth and Peter wanted him bad.

He was bragging about how he could get anyone here and Peter was fascinated with his lips and his hands but most of all his eyes.  
They were like honey and they matched his golden skin perfectly.

"Harley," he whispered, just loud enough for Harley to hear over the music and the people talking.

"Him." he said as he pointed at the honey boy.

Harley's eyes lit up. He smiled and nodded, Peter smiled in return and kissed him quickly before walking off.

This was Harley's favorite part. Or well, one of his favorite parts. Watching Peter hunt.

Because he did it so beautifully, all soft eyes and coy smiles, pretty words and prettier moves. The boy was his in no time.

What came next was definitely Harley's favorite part. The kill.

The boy was beautiful. So, so beautiful. Everything about him was perfect.

The way his hair stuck to his sweaty forehead, the way he panted, the way he screamed. It was all so beautiful.

"Harley, come look at this." Peter said, voice full of wonder.

Harley stopped what he was doing and bent down to Peter, heads next to each other so he saw exactly what he meant.

"Look" he repeated before gently placing his hand on golden abs.

The boy shivered at the touch.

The movement was soft, loving, metal over skin.

Crimson was Harley's favorite color and this boy had such a beautiful shade of it. The scent of iron filled the air and Harley sucked in a breath.

Peter's eyes were wide with awe and when Harley painted his lips in the boy's crimson he couldn't help but kiss him.

It was warm and tangy and bitter and they loved it with every fiber of their being.

Honey boy was dying and they were in love with his death. 

La petit mort as the French called it.

When they laid the boy down on their bed, chest open and eyes empty after all the bliss they couldn't help but marvel at their work 

They whispered sweet nothings to him and each other as they laid down left and right of the boy.

He didn't say anything back but that was okay, he didn't have to. In fact, they preferred it if he didn't. 

The morning was cold and rainy.

Peter and Harley took a shower together before they left for the open road again.

The boy was still in their bed but they didn't care anymore.

They were gone within the hour and miles away by sunrise.

They drove for days, weeks even. Rarely stopping anywhere besides small motels. Honey boy had been talking.

But the further they went away from him the less he mattered and after a while they forgot all about him. Or at least they pretended to.

By the time they reached Washington Peter was all cut up and Harley felt vaguely broken. But they were so in love.

They ran through the rainy streets of Seattle and made love in the damp dark forests. And after weeks, maybe even months, the longest they had ever gone without, they found another love.

The rain had been warm on their skin as they touched each other in the bright meadow. Peter looked breathtaking in the light and Harley sat up to kiss the blue and purple roses blooming on his stomach as Peter moved to the rhythm of the rain.

Afterwards, when they laid down in the grass, that was when they heard him.  
A sturdy frame, stumbling through the trees at the edge of the clearing, freezing at the sight of them. Icy blue eyes from underneath copper hair.

He reminded them so much of... 

He seemed like a faery almost, with those leaves tangled in his long hair and those eyes... Like the purest forest stream.

Peter got up gracefully and Harley followed him, a hand on his shoulder as they walked towards the faery boy like deer, all elegance and innocence.

They took his hands and pulled him back with them towards the light.

So much like...

The boy seemed almost as enchanted by them as they were with him and mirrored their every movement.

He lost his jacket as Harley kissed him, and his shirt when Peter reached around from behind him and guided his lips from Harley's to his own.  
He lost his trousers when Harley kissed his chest and Peter kissed his neck, he lost his breath inside Peter and Harley inside him.

He lost his life with love and two knives in his heart.

They made him flower crowns and daisy chains. They danced with him and painted themselves in his crimson, only for their drawings to be washed away by the rain moments later.

They laid on the forest floor with him, naked as the day they were born, and told him stories and faery tales.

Magic for their faery boy.

But when the rain stopped so did their love.

Faery boy was lying on the ground, flowers in his hair and drawings on his skin, the last few raindrops falling from the leaves high above into his wide-open eyes and running down his cheeks like silver tears. He looked like a fallen statue of a civilization thought to be long lost but in fact very much alive in the darkest corners of the woods.

Peter had taken his shirt and Harley had taken his jacket.

The boy didn't mind and Peter was in love with the painting of red and green and silver they had made on it. Harley took the jacket because it smelled like moss and rain and iron and faery magic.

They left the boy to be breathed by the forest and returned to their car.

When they hit the road Harley was humming a song in and Peter started humming along when he recognized it.

They got louder with every mile and by the end of the road they were screaming the song, laughing and crying at the same time.

Because this was their song.  
And it was faery boy's song  
And it had been her song.


	2. Chapter 2

California was a day and night's difference from the rainy Seattle woods.

The beach brought back memories they both shed tears over, and every now and then they thought they saw her in the crowd.

But it was never really her.

They had gotten a hotel, a nice one, the rooms were big, almost like an entire house, and they wondered how long they could stay there cause for the first time in a long while they felt like they were somewhat at home.

They loved the way the sun would shine through their curtains as they laid in bed, loved the way the breeze would blow in when they needed it most, with Harley on top and inside of Peter, loved the way the night was just the right temperature to still sleep comfortably.

But in a way they also hated those things.

Because the sun made sure they had to limit their love. 

Harley couldn't plant any more blue and purple roses on Peter's stomach so the ones that still lingered had turned green and yellow and brown. And Peter couldn't tear Harley apart anymore, because the sun would show his silver ragdoll stitches and they knew people wouldn't understand why Harley needed to be taken apart every now and then.

So after two weeks of loved and hated sunshine Peter made it clear they would need to hunt again.

And Harley couldn't agree more.

The problem was that everyone around them looked like her.

And not in the beautiful and pure way faery boy did, more like caricatures, sick jokes and terrible imitations.

But then Peter spotted her, standing by an ice cream stand, lips like roses, eating a vanilla ice cream cone, such an enormous contrast to her midnight skin that the beauty of it almost hurt.

She was a world of difference and Peter wanted her.

He subtly gestured her way as he simply whispered "Her." to Harley.

As soon as Harley saw her he agreed. She was exactly what they needed.

Peter walked over and she smiled when he called her Rosy, she laughed at his shy flirtations, she agreed to hang out with him and Harley when he told her they weren't local and had no idea where to go.

When he introduced her to Harley as Rosy she didn't correct him.

They spent their day going from shop to shop on the boulevard, talking and laughing and lying. 

As the sun sets they headed back to their hotel pool with her and a small voice in the back of Harley's mind reminded him they had avoided the beach. He knew that voice and that was exactly the reason why they had not set a foot onto the sand that day.

The pool was lit by pure moonlight and Rosy looked like ink in the water.

She floated on her back as Harley and Peter swam in circles around her, a painted water ballet.

Her hair seemed to stretch out endlessly on the small waves they created and her ink fanned out from her body as she sank to the bottom of the pool and bounced back up.

They drank her in like poison.

The stars illuminated the silver lines of the water on her skin, the shine and glow of it all enthralled them.

But when the stars faded and the moon went to shine somewhere else, Rosy was no more.

Her lips were dawn blue and her skin was a mix of sunset red and ashy grey.

They left her alone in the pool and went back to their room to pack their bags and wash away the ink and chlorine.

When they walked to their car she was still there, but they paid no more attention to her. 

She had turned into a caricature of herself, just like how everyone else had been a caricature of her.

California felt cold that morning.

Vegas was bright.

It outshone the stars and the moon and even the hot desert sun.

They loved the bright lights, they blended in with them. Everyone was crazy and they felt comfortable knowing their crazy didn't stick out as much here.  
Blue and purple roses bloomed again. Silver thread was spun once more.

For a while they didn't need anyone else, they had each other and that was plenty. Too much at points, but they managed. They always did.

They heard rumors that Rosy had become a star on the six o'clock news but they didn't care. She was in their past and they had only looked back on that once.

They gambled and won in the casino's, they danced and loved in the clubs and they sang and screamed at concerts in the desert.

They ran on adrenaline and smiles for days until they collapsed on a bed or a sofa or a soft surface somewhere.

And then one night, when they hadn't even so much as thought about hunting again for weeks, someone presented themselves.

Literally.

They were sitting near a campfire in the desert, a few feet from someone strumming a guitar and a few people dancing.

Harley had silver threads wound up and down his arms and neck and Peter was painted in roses from waist to crown.

Suddenly there was a vision, a fata morgana; a person, dressed in white flowing fabric came walking towards them from the depths of the desert, their long brown hair hanging down to their waist and adorned with flowers.

But this fata morgana was real. And they called themselves X. And for the first time since her, they went with it.

X was beautiful and broken and when X asked them to be fixed they knew exactly what to do.

Their reputation had prevailed them. Honey boy and Rosy had told stories about them. Only Faerie boy had been quiet. And X was in love with their tales. X wanted to be part of them.

X wanted to bloom like a crimson rose in the desert and Peter and Harley were the ones X had chosen to be planted by.

They didn’t do requests, not anymore, but X was different.

X knew exactly what they were asking and they couldn't resist. It would be unlike anything they had ever done before, but then again, Vegas was unlike any place they had ever been before. It fit like the others had not.

So they took X into the desert.

They blasted music from their car and made a campfire of their own, away from the crowds. They danced and smiled and cried and X started to bloom, petal by crimson petal.

They made art, the three of them. They had planted a garden and X would be their sunflower on a pedestal. Next to their wilting lily of her.

It was a harmony of destroying and creating that amazed them in its difference.

X was being torn to shreds while being pieced together at the same time.

Silver blades hacked away at marble to reveal what had been inside the stone all along.

White fabric fluttered in the wind as long brown curls tangled and formed into a crown.

The stars shone long and bright that night, as the darkness seemed to last forever.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the first shy rays of sunlight laid their soft hands upon their garden, and saw a flower in bloom, standing proudly in the desert sand, a flecked flora of white, brown, and red.

Their work was done and Peter, Harley and X all smiled in unison.

As they got into their car, paint and dirt still covering their happy faces, they shared a soft kiss that would last them for miles.


	3. Chapter 3

Father Emmanuel knew you could buy a gun anywhere in Texas.

It was one of the reasons he moved to the state. That and its conservatism.

Emmanuel was a man of tradition and rules. Strict rules. The rules of the Lord. 

And he made sure those rules were being followed in his town and his church.

Differences were looked down upon, abnormalities were shunned and when a boy came to his territory and held the hand of another boy in his church he made sure that would never happen again.

A lecture would do. One in the church itself and one in the town square.

An example had to be made and since the two were from out of town they were an easy target.

But not as easy as father Emmanuel himself.  
The church was hot late at night. Especially when you were kneeling in front of a sea of candles.

If you listened closely you could hear soft whispered prayers, a hymn being sung, footsteps on a stone floor.

A croaky voice came closer to the father, singing the hymn he was named after. 

But not in the way the lord had ever intended it.

It sounded mocking, and when Emmanuel turned around he saw the boy covered in horrible scars walking towards him as the boy covered in bruises danced around him.

The father tried to get up but suddenly there was a bang and a searing pain in his left leg and he fell back onto the steps of the altar.

The bruised boy laughed without joy as they came closer and Emmanuel saw the glint of a revolver in the other boy's hand.

"You know Emmanuel, you should really lock the doors of the church after dark. You never know who might come in." Harley said.

Another bang, another searing pain in his other leg.

"Look at us for example," Peter added "we’re the scum of the earth, are we not?"

Emmanuel tried to yell at them to get out of his church but Harley interrupted him.

"Two filthy sodomites as you called it." A smile appeared on his face.

"well trust me Emmanuel, that's not the worst thing we are."

A bang.  
Pain in his stomach.

"Unlike all those before you, and all those after you, we will not enjoy this." Peter said.

A kiss.  
A bang.  
No pain.  
No sound.  
No breath.

The sound of someone heaving and two pairs of footsteps leaving.

The locals knew what had happened.

If they weren't hunted before they certainly were now.

But they didn't care.

They drove out of Texas, vowing to never return and to never do this again.

The wind coming in through the car windows cleansed them from their sins, the elements would forgive them, and that was all the redemption they needed.

New Orleans was beautiful.

The city had an air of history and mystery like no other.

The midsummer nights were hot and humid, yet Harley and Peter had never slept closer to each other than they did in New Orleans.

The city streets were bubbling with music and laughter yet they preferred the quiet shadows of the bayou.

They walked there daily, not wanting to see anyone but each other for weeks.

They were wanted but they didn't want anything.

For the first time in years they preferred home over the road. And even though Louisiana wasn't their home, it was better than the alternative.

They were lost in their own world.

When they found Sweets in the forest on one of their walks they regained some of the direction they had lost.

He was sitting next to a small lake, surrounded by trees on all sides, smoking a cigarette, watching something sink.

He was a dapper-looking man in his early twenties with beautifully stylish dark hair and piercing blue eyes that always made him look like he was smiling.

He called Harley Sugar and Peter Honey.

He took them back into the city and showed them the quiet shadowy spaces there.

He told them you don't go into the bayou by your selves unless you're looking for death or looking to get rid of it.

They didn't have to ask why he had been there.

He met up with them nightly, always shortly after dusk and until moments before dawn. And then he would leave, in the middle of sentences and with stories left unfinished.

He turned them into inhabitants of the night when they had always lived under the sun. They learned to appreciate the light of the moon in ways they had never even considered the sun.

The dark and smoky bars Sweets took them to started to feel like home, and they loved his warm southern voice more and more each day.

He would sing them songs on rooftops and in graveyards and they would waltz together under the stars.

He would sometimes come to them with flecks of crimson on his white shirts and they would ask him how his night had been.

He would simply smile and say "It was beautiful, my sweet boys." And they knew exactly what he meant.

But when the night came where they heard him before they saw him, screaming their names, Sugar and Honey, outside their window, and his shirt was more crimson than white, they knew his night had not been beautiful.

Rain fell from them as they opened their doors and arms to him.

He asked them to wash him, they were after his scent.

He asked them to drown him, they were after his hands.

They took Sweets back to the lake where they had found him. They shared a cigarette on the shore as he told them what to do.

Even after they disposed of the weeds, their garden was still growing.

The lake was covered in white water lilies which reflected an azure blue in Sweets' eyes.

He said goodbye to Honey, and farewell to Sugar, and they watched something sink.

They left New Orleans with a hole in their hearts.

But Sweets' scent would follow them, and they could feel his hands on their shoulders.


	4. Chapter 4

They were close to home, but with no intention of returning. **  
**

Not yet.

They would forever need more love. More love for the purple roses and more love for the silver thread, so they didn't wilt, so they didn't snap.

They drove through New York on those summer days that whisper they long to be autumn, when the sun is too shy to shine and the moon and clouds take over instead.

The sky was paying homage to Sweets, who's silence had said more than the stories anyone else had told.

They drove around the neighborhoods in a watery haze, not sure who or what they were looking for, or if they were even looking at all.

They didn't expect a forest, they didn't expect a lone streetlight in the darkness, they didn't expect a man like a tear, in every sense of the word, standing in the orange light, thick smoke fluttering from his lips only to be shot to bits by the cold rain.

When they pulled up he looked at them, familiar blue eyes under soaked dark curls and when lightning flashed his face seemed to change.

He looked sad, but then again so did they.

Tear got in the back of the car without a word.

Harley wanted to drive off. He really did. But when he couldn't Peter simply put a hand on his arm and nodded.

Peter climbed in the back and took Tear's face in his hands.

"Are you loved?" he asked, and Tear lived up to his name.

"From afar." He said.

"Too far." His voice broke.

"You are loved from nearby now." Peter replied as he wiped the water from Tear's face with his thumbs.

Harley watched Peter.

He worked meticulously, focused on what was beneath his hands and in front of his face.

Tears had dried before he had even started. And Harley cried.

He would miss him, as he missed them, and suddenly he craved the sensation of Faery boy's jacket across his shoulders, he wanted to see Honey boy's smile, feel Rosy's warm skin, hear X's laughter and dance with Sweets.

Just once more.

He wanted to hold her.

When Peter was done Harley got Faery's jacket out of the trunk. He splayed it over Tear and himself on the backseat as Peter drove.

Harley didn't want to cry, but Tear was still soft and warm and he couldn't help himself. He knew Peter wouldn’t wouldn't judge and neither would Tear.

They dropped him off at a building that looked like a church, but Tear had told them was his home.

They didn't want to leave him, he was like all their loves in one, but they had to.

Tear had to go home, and after all, so did they.

They held him close once more before driving away. 

Back home.

Back to her.

Finally.

His fingers running on the wind outside the car window, that was one of the things Peter would miss the most.

He would miss the sun and the moon and the trees, oh god how he would miss the trees, he would miss traveling, the driving for hours and singing along to the radio and ending up in places you've never been before with people you've never met.

One of the things he wouldn't miss though, was Harley. Cause Peter knew, no matter where he'd go, Harley would be there.

And so would she.

Wanda.

_"Wanda!"_

_"Hi boys."_

_"Where are you going, baby?"_

_"Home, sweethearts! I'll see you there, don't get too dirty playing."_

_"We'll try."_

_"Can't make any promises though"_

Soft, warm laughter, ringing through the air.

The road looked familiar here and Peter felt cold. Harley's hand was warm but his smile was nervous and uncertain.

"We have to go back, Harls." Peter said.

"I know." He said, his voice like small waves on a lake.

_"What's it like?"_

_"Bittersweet"_

_"It's like creating art while destroying it."_

_"And could you ever do it to me?"_

_"If we don't to it to someone else first."_

Their town looked the same. Same white houses, same black streets. Same kids being picked up from school, same people at the bus stops. Everything was the same. Just older.

The graveyard was quiet. Just a few people here and there and the wind rustling through the weeping willows.

The headstone was white, golden letters stating a name and date.

"Beloved daughter and friend."

Their sign had been erased, either by time or by force they couldn't tell. But it was okay. Knives would work better than sharpie anyway.

They left her a message. One they intended on telling her months ago.

"You were right. It is beautiful to know what one's skull looks like."

She was beautiful.

Running backwards across the sand, dragging them along into the surf.

Her hair was every shade of red and her eyes were bluer than the sky and the sea combined.

She took them down with her as she fell into the water and washed the red off their hands and faces with kisses.

They laughed and danced and swam and build houses in the sand.

They talked and talked and talked until the sky was mostly void, partially stars and the moon was big and beautiful and watching the sea dance.

They kissed in circles and all at once and they loved with everything they had one more time.

Their house was still the same, and their keys still opened the door.

Inside everything was as they left it but with an extra few layers of dust and the foul smell of rotten food and dried copper.

The kitchen was big and light, the hanging baskets with herbs dried out and wilted but when they squinted they could still see her cooking (paprikash, her favorite) in the rays of light coming in through the blinds.

_"Can I taste?"_

_"No you can not. Peter get your finger out of that bowl. Harley! Just because I look away doesn't mean I can't see you!"_

When they looked through their eyelashes they could see her on the sofa in the living room, beckoning them to come sit under the blankets with her and fall asleep while watching movies.

_"Hey, wake up! this is the best bit."_

_"Baby, I'm tired."_

_"Shhh I wanna see this."_

As they walked upstairs hand in hand they swore they could hear her hum.

_"Come on Harley, sing with me, you have such a beautiful voice."_

_"Please Harls!"_

The bathroom echoed with laughter and splashing water as they walked by it.

_"Don't get my hair wet! I just dyed it."_

_"Use a blue towel, I don't wanna get anymore tie-dye laundry."_

_"Don't worry, it's Peter's turn to do laundry anyway. Ah! no splashing!"_

They halted in front of the bedroom door. They knew that as soon as they entered here everything would be over

They looked each other in the eye. Shaky breaths left their lips before they crashed together like waves on the beach. **  
**

They put every ounce of their beings into this kiss, hoping that if they abandoned all they were separately, maybe they would become one. They wanted every scar and bruise and gash to merge but all they could do was press themselves together and pray.

After what seemed like hours they realized they would never be as close as they were about to be.

Everything was still there.

Except for Wanda.

Her absence was marked by an empty chair and a white spot on the carpet.

_"I want you to do it."_

The last rays of sunshine filtered in through the windows.

_"We'll do it fast."_

They laid out their instruments on the empty chair, in honor of her.

_"No."_

They folded their shirts beside them as they knelt on the floor.

_"I want you to do it like we imagined. Like you promised."_

The first slash of the knife burned across Harley's skin.

The first one always hurt.

The first blow against Peter's stomach knocked the air out of his lungs.

The first one always hurt.

_"You don't have to hold back sweetheart, the first one always hurts. Let it out."_

They took turns.

Peter would drive his curved knife deep into Harley's skin until he felt bone against the metal and Harley would plant his fist on the same spot on Peters's chest until he felt snaps and cracks.

They were killing each other.

For real this time.

The small silver threads had been spun over and over until they became thick cables.

The roses had been planted and bloomed and wilted so many times the garden became exhausted.

The red and blue lights had followed them across the country and found them back at the start.

They felt her presence more and more as they deteriorated. Dancing and laughing around them as they smiled into the blood.

A knock on the front door.

Peter took out his knife.

A bang against the door.

Harley caught his breath.

Voices down the stairs.

They placed the knives at the hollow of the other's throat.

Heavy boots coming up.

"I love you." Exhaled in unison

The bedroom door flew open.

Silver disappearing in crimson.

_"You made me wait boys."_

_"You told us to pass on your love."_

_"Did you?"_

They did. 


End file.
